分类： science

The Alliance of Open Life Science has embarked on a significant global expansion initiative by extending membership invitations to 32 prestigious universities and research institutions worldwide. This development was announced during the alliance’s 2025 annual conference, which commenced in Guangzhou on Monday.

Among the distinguished institutions receiving invitations are the University of Oxford and Imperial College London, representing a major step in China’s commitment to advancing international collaboration in life sciences. The alliance, an international non-profit academic community formed voluntarily by universities and research institutions, has already received positive responses from several invitees.

The current gathering includes representatives from the alliance’s existing 33 member institutions. Academic leadership presented key developments, with CAS academician Jin Li, President of Fudan University, delivering the alliance’s work report. CAS academician Shi Yigong, President of Westlake University, outlined the development strategy for the alliance’s scientific journal.

Addressing the critical needs of what it termed the ‘big science era,’ the alliance emphasized that global cooperation is essential for tackling fundamental questions about life origins and health mysteries. The organization is dedicated to establishing a worldwide innovation network and cooperation mechanism to drive breakthroughs across life science research, technological advancement, talent development, and industrial innovation.

The conference also marked the induction of the alliance’s second cohort of new members. Since its establishment in August with 15 founding members—including Peking University, Tsinghua University, Fudan University, and Hong Kong University of Science and Technology—the alliance has grown to incorporate 18 additional institutions, now encompassing China’s premier life science research organizations.

Guided by the principle that science transcends national boundaries, the alliance commits to developing high-quality public goods and promoting open science development in life sciences and technology for the benefit of human society worldwide.

In a landmark achievement for materials science, Chinese researchers have earned global recognition for creating the world’s first two-dimensional metals, an accomplishment long considered nearly unattainable. This groundbreaking work, led by a team at the Institute of Physics under the Chinese Academy of Sciences, has been selected among Physics World’s prestigious “Top 10 Breakthroughs for 2025.”

The research, published in the renowned journal Nature in March 2025, represents a quantum leap in materials science that could potentially propel the next stage of human technological advancement. Since the discovery of monolayer graphene in 2004, 2D materials have fundamentally transformed scientific understanding of material properties and driven unprecedented innovations in condensed-matter physics.

According to Professor Zhang Guangyu, the project’s lead scientist, creating 2D metals presented extraordinary challenges due to the strong metallic bonds between atoms that occur in all directions. “The metallic bonding nature made conventional approaches to 2D material synthesis ineffective,” Zhang explained. “We had to fundamentally rethink material fabrication at the atomic level.”

The research team pioneered an innovative atomic-scale manufacturing technique called the van der Waals squeezing method, which enabled the creation of diverse 2D metals including bismuth, tin, lead, indium, and gallium. These ultra-thin materials measure just one millionth the thickness of a standard A4 paper sheet and approximately one 200,000th the diameter of a human hair.

The implications of this breakthrough extend across multiple technological domains. These novel 2D metals could revolutionize numerous industries through ultra-micro low-power transistors, high-frequency communication devices, transparent display technology, ultra-sensitive detection systems, and highly efficient catalytic processes.

Physics World, the flagship publication of the Institute of Physics (the professional body for physics in the UK and Ireland), annually recognizes achievements that demonstrate significant scientific importance, advance the frontiers of knowledge, and attract broad attention from the global physics community. The selection criteria emphasize rigorous scientific validation, seamless integration of theory and experiment, and profound implications for future research and applications.

Archaeologists have made a groundbreaking discovery in Northwest China’s Shaanxi province, unearthing a vast network of 573 ancient stone cities that date back approximately 4,800 to 3,800 years. This extraordinary find, resulting from six years of intensive survey work in the Yulin region, fundamentally reshapes our understanding of early Chinese civilization patterns and challenges long-held historical paradigms.

The newly discovered urban centers, constructed between 2800 BC and 1000 BC, represent the largest and most sophisticated prehistoric stone city complex ever identified in northern China. According to Ma Mingzhi, associate researcher of Yulin’s cultural relics and archaeological survey team, these findings dramatically surpass previous records—before this survey, fewer than 200 prehistoric city sites had been documented nationwide, with only several dozen being stone constructions.

The architectural sophistication reveals a clearly stratified society with hierarchical urban planning principles. Higher-status inhabitants occupied central zones with more complex defensive walls, while outer areas housed those of relatively lower status. These settlements, strategically positioned along riverbanks, served multiple functions including military defense, residential settlement, and religious ritual. The Shimao site features particularly remarkable stone carvings depicting divine faces, dragons, and snakes, alongside noble burial grounds and structures believed to be ancestral temples.

This discovery effectively dismantles the traditional ‘Central Plains-centric theory’ of Chinese civilization development, demonstrating that northern Shaanxi served as a crucial cultural hub during the early Xia Dynasty (c. 21st-16th century BC). The scale of urbanization—with over 600 stone cities now identified across Shaanxi, Inner Mongolia, Shanxi, and Hebei provinces—corroborates ancient literary references to an ‘era of ten thousand states’ that historians previously considered potentially fictional.

Professor Han Jianye from Renmin University of China notes that the construction timeline coincides with the legendary Yellow Emperor era, suggesting the region served as both a cultural core and a defensive prototype for what would eventually become the Great Wall. The sites demonstrate clear evolutionary progression, with settlements expanding in scale, spatial layouts growing more complex, and construction techniques advancing significantly over centuries of continuous use.

Future research will focus on environmental support systems, handicraft production, regional economic development, and genetic analysis of population movements. These investigations promise to illuminate the material foundations that sustained this remarkable urban network and its interactions with contemporary ethnic groups, potentially rewriting our understanding of state formation processes in ancient East Asia.

Paleontologists have identified a colossal new dinosaur species that roamed the terrain of present-day Chongqing approximately 160 million years ago during the Late Jurassic period. The monumental discovery, formally classified as Mamenchisaurus sanjiangensis, was detailed in a groundbreaking study published in the prestigious journal Scientific Reports.

The fossilized remains were originally unearthed in 2015 within Chongqing’s Hechuan district, a region situated at the convergence of the Jialing, Fujiang, and Qujiang rivers—a geographic feature that inspired the species’ nomenclature. With an estimated body length reaching 24 meters, comparable to the dimensions of a modern blue whale, this sauropod represents one of the most substantial dinosaur specimens ever recovered from the municipality.

Research led by Dai Hui of the Chongqing Institute of Paleontology revealed that although the newly identified species shares close phylogenetic relationships with Mamenchisaurus hochuanensis, meticulous analysis of skeletal structures confirmed its distinct taxonomic status. The remarkably preserved fossil assemblage includes an extensive series of cervical, dorsal, and caudal vertebrae, alongside pelvic elements and portions of the left limb.

This significant paleontological breakthrough emerged from the Upper Shaximiao Formation, a stratigraphic layer renowned for yielding numerous iconic Chinese dinosaur discoveries. The excavation and subsequent analysis mark a substantial advancement in Chongqing’s paleontological capabilities, providing crucial insights into sauropod diversification across East Asia during the Jurassic era. Mamenchisaurus sanjiangensis constitutes the eleventh novel dinosaur species identified in China throughout 2024, elevating Chongqing’s confirmed dinosaur species tally to fifteen.

In a revolutionary approach to cancer treatment, researchers at Zhejiang University have successfully transformed mast cells—typically known for triggering allergic responses—into precision weapons against cancerous tumors. This innovative strategy merges targeted immune system activation with advanced drug delivery mechanisms.

The research, published in the prestigious journal Cell, represents a collaboration between Professors Gu Zhen and Yu Jicheng of Zhejiang University and Professor Liu Fujian of China Medical University. Their work focuses on repurposing mast cells, a type of white blood cell traditionally associated with allergic reactions such as hay fever or food sensitivities, into specialized carriers for oncolytic viruses designed to eliminate cancer cells.

The scientific breakthrough involves equipping mast cells with immunoglobulin E (IgE) antibodies specifically engineered to recognize unique protein markers on tumor cells. This biological reprogramming effectively converts these cells into precision-guided vehicles that seek out and infiltrate cancerous growths.

Once these modified mast cells reach their target, they unleash their therapeutic payload through a controlled release mechanism reminiscent of an allergic reaction. This process delivers a concentrated dose of cancer-killing viruses directly to the tumor site while simultaneously activating additional immune defenses, including CD8+ T cells, to join the attack.

In preclinical studies involving mouse models of melanoma, breast cancer, and metastatic lung cancer, the approach demonstrated significant tumor growth suppression and improved survival rates. Notably, in experiments using patient-derived tumor models with elevated HER2 protein levels (common in certain breast cancers), the treatment triggered robust immune responses and substantial tumor reduction.

The platform’s adaptability allows for personalized cancer treatment by tailoring IgE antibodies to target patient-specific tumor proteins. Researchers suggest this mast cell technology could also be adapted to deliver other therapeutic agents, including small-molecule drugs or antibodies.

The research team is currently advancing the technology toward clinical applications, focusing on optimizing production processes, selecting patient-specific IgE antibodies, and exploring combination therapies with existing immunotherapies.

Meteorological authorities warn that eastern and southern regions of China face heightened drought risks throughout winter and into spring 2026 due to persistent La Nina conditions in the equatorial Pacific. While climate experts confirm the unlikely development of a full-scale La Nina event, the existing oceanic cooling pattern continues to disrupt normal precipitation distribution across affected regions.

The National Climate Center’s monitoring data indicates that La Nina conditions became established in October 2025, characterized by unusually cool sea surface temperatures across the central and eastern equatorial Pacific. According to Zhang Daquan, Deputy Director of the center’s climate prediction division, meteorologists utilize the Nino 3.4 index as the standard measurement for such phenomena, with values dropping below -0.5°C indicating La Nina conditions.

Climate scientists emphasize the critical distinction between La Nina conditions and official La Nina events. The latter requires the Nino 3.4 index to remain below the -0.5°C threshold for five consecutive months—a duration not expected in the current scenario. Forecast models project the cooling pattern will persist for two to three months before transitioning toward neutral conditions around February or March 2026.

The meteorological mechanism involves La Nina generating cyclonic circulation anomalies over the western North Pacific and South China Sea. This atmospheric configuration produces prevailing northeasterly winds that impede moisture transport from tropical regions—China’s primary winter vapor source. Consequently, precipitation deficits are anticipated across eastern and southern provinces.

Contrary to public assumptions linking La Nina with severe winter cold, temperature projections indicate near-average or slightly above-average winter temperatures nationwide. Zhang clarified that multiple factors beyond La Nina—including Arctic sea ice coverage, Eurasian snow accumulation, and natural atmospheric variability—collectively influence China’s seasonal climate patterns.

The National Climate Center anticipates increased temperature volatility throughout winter, featuring more pronounced alternations between cold spells and warm periods. This variability occurs alongside the predicted precipitation reduction, creating complex weather challenges for agricultural and water resource management sectors.